Thursday, February 28, 2013

Sanger’s Racist Legacy Lives on in New York City Schools

In 1930, Margaret Sanger’s Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau allied with
the Urban League to bring birth control services to the women of
Harlem. By 1939, Sanger had raised thousands of dollars to support an
expansion of the initiative she named “The Negro Project.” Targeted
toward reducing an African-American population described in Sanger’s
June, 1932 edition of Birth Control Review as “breeding
carelessly and disastrously,” these early birth control clinics seem to
have provided a model for New York City’s School Based Health Centers.

Today, New York City’s public school students—underage and without
parental knowledge—are given access to birth control pills, Depo-Provera
injections, and the insertion of plastic IUDs to prevent pregnancy. In
an analysis of the records of 40 school based health centers in New York
City—most of them in schools with large minority populations, the New YorkPost revealed that about 22,400 students sought reproductive care from January, 2009 through 2012.
In addition to these routine contraceptives, the City’s schools are
providing students with Plan-B, the “morning-after pill” to prevent
pregnancy. The Post reports that “handouts of the morning-after
pill to sexually active students have skyrocketed” from 5,039 doses
given to teenage students during the 2009-10 school year, to 12,721
doses given in 2011-12. Under New York State law, minors can obtain
reproductive services without their parent’s permission.

Like Sanger’s early alliances with the City, New York’s Bureau of
Maternal, Infant and Reproductive Health launched the current
contraceptive project with a grant from the Fund for Public Health in
New York. According to an internal report published by the City, and
obtained by a Freedom of Information Law request by the Post, New
York City spent $2.7 million on the centers this fiscal year. While the
report lauds the reduction in teen pregnancies in the city, it seems
that there are some parents, like Mona Davids, president of the NYC
Parents Union, who have been critical of the program. According to the Post,
Davids, an African-American, noted that most school based health
centers are in poor neighborhoods: “This was population control on
blacks and Latinos without our knowledge.”

Davids is correct. The National Assembly on School Based Health Care
Census report documents that nationally, 70% of the student body in
schools with school based health centers are members of minority groups.
These groups have long been targeted for all reproductive
services—especially abortion. According to the Guttmacher Institute,
the abortion rate for black women is almost five times that for white
women.

The Reverend Clenard Childress, president of the largest African
American evangelical pro-life group in the country identifies abortion
providers as marketing reproductive services directly to black women.
He blames the availability of these services within the poor urban
communities—claiming that their presence in the minority neighborhoods
decrease the stigma of such services by signaling social approval for
these services—what economists call “reducing the psychic costs.”
The reality is that when an abortion clinic is located in the
neighborhood, residents are more likely to see it as just another
neighborhood service—like dollar stores and nail salons. Many children
grow up in urban neighborhoods seeing abortion clinics on their street
corners as they walk to school. Now, they are seeing reproductive
services—including the morning after pill—dispensed at their own
schools.

The Sanger legacy of encouraging population control for blacks to
benefit society continues—even within academia. Professors John Donohue
and Steven Levitt of the University of California at Berkeley provided a
powerful economic argument in favor of abortion in 1999 that relied on
the same stereotypes first promoted by the eugenicists of the Sanger
era. In a paper published in the U.C. Berkeley Law and Economics
Working Paper Series (No. 2000-18) entitled “The Impact of Legalized
Abortion on Crime,” Donohue and Levitt used elaborate mathematical
models to marshal evidence that legalized abortion has contributed to
crime reductions. They concluded that more abortions by African
American women result in fewer homicides for society, and warn that any
restrictions on abortion will result in increased crime because
“homicide rates of black youth are roughly nine times higher than those
of white youths.”
It is likely that these abortion rates for African Americans will
continue to rise. Now, New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo—a Catholic who
was described in a February 19th column in The New York Times by
Ross Douthat as a “functionally post-Catholic creature of the
Bloombergist center-left”—has recently moved to reduce any of the
state’s restrictions on late-term abortions. Expanding access to late
term abortion when the woman’s health is at stake rather than just, as
the current law states, when her life is in danger, Cuomo continues to
defy Catholic teachings in his quest to increase the number of late-term
abortions in New York.

In an interview on TALK 1300 AM Radio, a local radio station in
Albany, Dennis Poust, Director of Communications for the New York State
Catholic Conference decried Cuomo’s decision to expand access to late
term abortion. But, Catholic parents of children in New York City
public schools have no choice in their children’s access to abortion and
contraception. City officials seem proud that their teen pregnancy
rates are declining. But, it is at a high cost for poor families. It is
likely that Ms. Davids and the NYC Parents Union will continue to ask
questions about a school-based program that appears to replicate the
eugenics project implemented by Margaret Sanger back in the 1930s.

3 Years of Obamacare: Millions Lose Their Current Coverage

Obamacare has been law for nearly three years, with its anniversary
approaching on March 23. And while the major provisions (exchange
subsidies and Medicaid expansion) aren’t slated to begin until 2014,
Obamacare is already having devastating effects on Americans and their
health care.
Recall that fateful Presidential promise,
made on several occasions during the health care reform debate, “If you
like your health care plan, you’ll be able to keep your health care
plan, period. No one will take it away, no matter what.”
Despite the President’s promise, Heritage warned that many provisions in Obamacare would encourage employers to drop health coverage for their workers:

Many businesses and their employees—especially
lower-income employees—will find that replacing ESI [employer-sponsored
insurance] plans with subsidized coverage on the exchanges is mutually
beneficial. Employers would no longer offer health insurance but would
offer wage increases as wages and benefits are substitutes in an
employee’s net compensation. At the same time, these workers will still
have access to coverage through the exchanges with the subsidies or
through Medicaid.

Heritage had it right. As employers and businesses prepare for the
law’s major insurance regulations and mandates to begin next year, more
stories of people losing their current coverage are emerging.
Most recently, Universal Orlando announced
that it will no longer offer coverage for its part-time workers. The
reason is Obamacare’s prohibition of annual benefit limits beginning in
2014, causing Universal’s plans to become too expensive. It’s estimated
this will affect about 500 Universal employees. But the law began
phasing out annual limits over the past few years, which Universal—along
with 1,230 other health plans—had a waiver for. However, those waivers expire January 1, 2014, and the likely outcome will be that the nearly 4 million Americans enrolled in those plans will be forced out of their current health plan.

Another group who will lose their current coverage in 2014 is the
American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA). According to a news release,
“[M]edical coverage will end for some 17,500 Association members and
thousands of their dependents at year’s end.” The underwriter of AVMA’s
medical coverage blames “regulatory requirements put in place as a
result of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act signed by
President Obama in 2010.” However, the Association plans to offer other
coverage by operating its own private exchange in 2014.
There will likely be many more of these stories over the next few
years, as the Congressional Budget Office projects that, on net, 7 million Americans will lose their ESI by 2022 due to the enactment of Obamacare.

Worse yet, there are plenty of other studies that predict the loss of ESI will be much greater. McKinsey & Company, a consulting firm, found that “30 percent of employers will definitely or probably stop offering ESI in the years after 2014.”

Deloitte, another consulting firm, found that around 10 percent of employers would drop coverage and send their employees into the new government-run exchanges.
While these results vary in severity, they all mean that Obamacare
will cause millions of Americans to lose their current health care
coverage—which is just one of Obamacare’s many broken promises.

Why Marriage Matters for America and Conservatism

Some former officials in the Republican Party are urging the Supreme Court to redefine marriage for the nation.
But support for marriage as the union of a man and a woman is essential
to American—and conservative—principles. Indeed, nothing could be less
conservative than urging an activist court to redefine an essential
institution of civil society.

As my co-authors and I argue in our new book, What Is Marriage?, and in the amicus brief we filed with the Supreme Court,
marriage exists to bring a man and a woman together as husband and wife
to be father and mother to any children their union produces. It is
based on the anthropological truth that men and women are different and
complementary, on the biological fact that reproduction depends on a man
and a woman, and on the social reality that children need a mother and a
father. Marriage has public purposes that transcend its private
purposes.

Marriage predates government. It is the fundamental building block of
all human civilization. All Americans, especially conservatives, should
respect this crucial institution of civil society. This is why 41
states, with good reason, affirm that marriage is between a man and a
woman.
Government recognizes marriage because it is an institution that
benefits society in a way that no other relationship does. Marriage is
society’s least restrictive means to ensure the well-being of children.
State recognition of marriage protects children by encouraging men and
women to commit to each other and take responsibility for their
children. While respecting everyone’s liberty, government rightly
recognizes, protects, and promotes marriage as the ideal institution for
childbearing and childrearing.

Redefining marriage would further distance marriage from the needs of
children. It would deny as a matter of policy the ideal that a child
needs a mom and a dad. We know that children tend to do best when raised
by a mother and a father. The confusion resulting from further
delinking childbearing from marriage would force the state to intervene
more often in family life and cause welfare programs to grow even more.

In recent years marriage has been weakened by a revisionist view that
is more about adults’ desires than children’s needs. Redefining
marriage represents the culmination of this revisionism: Emotional
intensity would be the only thing left to set marriage apart from other
kinds of relationships. Redefining marriage would put a new principle
into the law—that marriage is whatever emotional bond the government
says it is.
Redefining marriage to abandon the norm of male-female sexual
complementarity would also make other essential characteristics—such as
monogamy, exclusivity, and permanency—optional. But marriage can’t do
the work that society needs it to do if these norms are further
weakened. All Americans, especially conservatives who care about
thriving civil society capable of limiting the state, should be alarmed.

Redefining marriage is a direct and demonstrated threat to religious freedom
that marginalizes those who affirm marriage as the union of a man and a
woman. We have already seen this in neighboring Canada and right here
in places such as Massachusetts and Washington, D.C.
What should the Supreme Court do? The Supreme Court should not usurp democratic authority from citizens and their elected officials. In a Heritage Legal Memorandum
detailing the constitutional issues in the marriage cases before the
Court, law professor John Eastman argues that the Constitution does not
answer the policy questions about redefining marriage, thus:

The ultimate question before the Court, then, is whether
the decision to embark on such an experiment is to be made by the
people, either through their legislatures or directly by voter
initiative, or whether the Constitution, which is silent on this precise
question, must be interpreted to have already answered the question.

Promoting marriage doesn’t ban any type of relationship: Adults are
free to make choices about their relationships, and they do not need
government sanction or license to do so. All Americans have the right to
live as they choose, but no one has a right to redefine marriage for
the rest of us.

Despite the fact that women have “almost unlimited access to
abortion, as evidenced by abortion rates which are nearly double the
national average,” as Nolte noted in a letter to an Empire State
newspaper this week, the governor’s agenda includes expanding access to
abortion in New York State, including by allowing non-physicians to
perform abortions.
“Women faced with unplanned pregnancies want and need access to
life-affirming alternatives to abortion, less bureaucratic obstacles to
adoption, more support and resources to enable them to bear their
children and raise their families with dignity,” she implored.
“Women given a poor prenatal diagnosis need love and support as they
parent their child through whatever months of life that child may have,
not pressure to end the life of their child. Most of my post-abortive
patients tell me that they didn’t want to ‘choose abortion’ but did so
only because they felt like they ‘had no other choice,’” she shared.
Dr. Nolte begs New York lawmakers to challenge the
governor’s cheerleading — literally, there was “choice!” chanting from
the governor during his State of the State address—and
to consider alternative legislative moves, to not buy into the
conventional narrative that insists that it is acceptable to equate
“women’s health” and freedom with a radical safe, legal, and seemingly preferred-abortion mindset.

Dr. Nolte will be joined by fellow doctors in Albany today urging the
reconsideration of the governor’s “reproductive health” agenda. She is
protesting the agenda with the confidence that New Yorkers don’t
consider abortion expansion a priority for New York. A poll from the Chiaroscuro Foundation makes this clear. Even pro-choice Democrats think the abortion rate in New York is alarmingly high.
Not for the first time, the best friend of a radical reproductive-health agenda is misinformation, confusion, spin.
Dr. Nolte talks about the legislation and what drives her to Albany in an interview with National Review Online.

KATHRYN JEAN LOPEZ: Why are you protesting the governor’s agenda with regard to abortion?DR. ANNE NOLTE: Though Governor
Cuomo has not yet proposed specific legislation, his comments to the
media suggest he plans to introduce legislation similar to the bill
commonly referred to as the “Reproductive Health Act,” which could be
used to allow abortion even of an infant who can survive outside of the
womb and which would allow non-physicians to perform invasive surgical
abortions in medical clinics outside of a hospital setting.
I, like many of my colleagues, believe that such legislation makes
abortion less safe for women. We worry it will increase the use of
late-term abortion when this type of abortion is not necessary to
protect a woman’s health. And it devalues the lives of our second
patient — the infant in the womb.
We are also concerned about defining abortion as a “right,” which the
Reproductive Health Act would do. Does this mean that doctors and
institutions which refuse to provide abortion for religious or moral
reasons will be charged with “discrimination” for failing to respect
this right? Will we be fined? Lose our licenses? These are real and
serious concerns that lawmakers in Albany must not gloss over.LOPEZ: Aren’t you doing a disservice to women, and even children, in New York by opposing this?DR. NOLTE: Quite the opposite.
Many physicians oppose abortion because we have all cared for women who
have suffered physical or emotional complications from a past abortion.
The risk of physical complications from a surgical abortion increases,
the later in pregnancy that these procedures are performed. If the
“termination” of a pregnancy after 24 weeks is required to protect a
woman’s health, this can be accomplished by inducing labor or performing
a C-section – options that are safer than late-term abortion when a
woman’s life or health is truly at risk and that preserve the life of
the infant. Both mother and child are better off when we recognize that
late-term abortion is not good health care.
Further, as physicians who care for pregnant women, we have two patients. Women trust us because of this fact — that we are dedicated to preserving both
the health of the mother and the health of the child in her womb. When
we provide care, our goal is to provide the best care to both of these
patients, no matter what the circumstance — not to pit mother against
child for the sake of advancing a political agenda.

LOPEZ: Why do you believe this legislation represents ”abortion expansion”?DR. NOLTE: The rate of abortion
in New York State is double the national average. In some parts of New
York City, over 60 percent of pregnancies end in abortion. It is
estimated that 90 percent of children with Down Syndrome are aborted,
and many abortions after viability occur because the child was given a
poor diagnosis, such as Down Syndrome. All of these statistics represent
the current state of affairs under current New York law.
With staggering statistics like these confirming that there is no
lack of access to abortion in New York State, why would we seek to allow
less qualified, non-physician health-care providers, with less surgical
training, and less experience managing complications of surgery, to
perform abortions? Why would we allow outpatient abortion clinics to
perform late-term abortions, with the inherently higher risk of
complications, rather than continue to require that high-risk procedures
be performed in the safety of a hospital? The Reproductive Health Act,
as it is currently written, does both of these — expanding access to
abortion, while decreasing its safety. These regulations represent a
step backward, to more abortion and less safety for women.

LOPEZ: What about expanding late-term abortions?DR. NOLTE: Let’s be clear. The
RHA and Governor Cuomo’s comments both clearly indicate that they want
to allow abortion through all 40 weeks of pregnancy if it is necessary
to protect the “health” of the mother. This is deceptive. As I already
mentioned, any complications of pregnancy after 24 weeks’ gestation can
be managed safely by delivering the living child, whether by induction
of labor or by C-section. The death of the child is never medically
necessary to preserve the mother’s health. “Health” however has been
broadly interpreted to mean not just serious, life-threatening
conditions, like high blood pressure or pre-eclampsia, but also any
disturbance of “mental health.” This essentially allows a woman to
terminate her pregnancy through all 40 weeks of pregnancy for any reason
that “upsets her mental health.” As a single example, one young woman,
who spoke before the New York City Council a few years ago, testified
that she was pressured at an abortion clinic to say she was “depressed”
by her pregnancy, because it would be the only way for her to get a
legal abortion at 25 weeks’ gestation.

LOPEZ: “Choice” was the rallying
cry of the governor during his State of the State address when he
talked about this. Aren’t you lending support to a “war on women” that
Catholics and pro-life folks are so often accused of waging?DR. NOLTE: Again, we feel that
the opposite is true. Abortion harms women. In my family practice over
the past seven years, I have asked every woman who has had an abortion
if she has experienced any negative effects, physical or emotional. I
have been surprised by the number who have had physical complications,
as I was always taught that these were “rare.” But besides that, thus
far only one woman has said that she did not regret her abortion.
Many have experienced depression, anxiety, flashbacks, and regret.
Some live in fear of their spouse or living children finding out about
an abortion they had as a teenager. Some are infertile and are tormented
by the knowledge that they aborted the only child they will ever have.
Some terminated a pregnancy for a birth defect, and mourn the loss of
the precious time they could have had to parent the child for as long as
her natural life would have lasted. Thousands of women have sought help
for the emotional trauma caused by their abortion.
Reasonable limits on abortion are not promoted to take away women’s
rights, wage war on women, or harm them. They are actually protective of
women.
For instance, prohibiting late-term abortions protects women who have
been given a poor prenatal diagnosis from the intense pressure they
often experience from peers and even from the medical profession to end
their pregnancy. When supported and given the chance, many women whose
unborn child is given a life-limiting diagnosis want to parent the child
during whatever days, weeks, or months of life that child may have.
When abortion is not an option, it allows the whole medical team to turn
their attention to what they do best — caring for mother and child in a difficult circumstance. This is evidenced by the success of programs such as perinatal hospice.
Another example: Requiring a waiting period, as some states do, gives
women time to think through and process the roller coaster of emotions
they experience when they first discover that they are unexpectedly
pregnant.
As physicians, we are taught that the worst time to make a decision
is when you are in a crisis. It takes time for emotions to settle and
for a person to rationally weigh her options in the context of her
personal values. A waiting period allows women to make a choice they can
live with and not one dictated by the impulse of fear. It also protects
them from unscrupulous providers of abortion who may take advantage of
this vulnerable state of the woman for financial gain.
These are just a few examples, but they demonstrate that it is
reasonable to limit abortion — something with which most Americans
agree.

LOPEZ: Your press conference is
being held in conjunction with the New York State Catholic Conference;
Cardinal Dolan has urged the governor to rethink his agenda here; and
yours is a Catholic medical practice. Why should Catholic doctrine have
anything to say about Empire State public policy?DR. NOLTE: It is not Catholic
doctrine that motivates the concern of the physicians speaking at our
press conference. In fact, we will be joined by other Christian and
Jewish colleagues.
What motivates us to speak out is our experience working with women
and our conviction that abortion is not good for women. Women do not
need greater access to abortion in New York State, they need greater
access to prenatal care, less burdensome adoption laws, community
support when they are given an adverse diagnosis, working conditions
that allow them to work and parent their children, and protection from pregnancy discrimination.

LOPEZ: Do you feel a particular obligation as a doctor to speak up in regard to the push for the Reproductive Health Act?DR. NOLTE: I do. When I listen
to politicians speak about abortion, I am struck by how little they seem
to understand about the real experiences and needs of women with
unplanned pregnancies. Sometimes it seems like they care more about
advancing a political agenda than about actually protecting women. I am
not an expert in law or politics, but I know what my patients have told
me — and what they have told me has convinced me that more abortion is
not good for women.

LOPEZ: You live in a state that
is not exactly a bastion of pro-life activism. Shouldn’t you just let
this go? Why is it worth fighting for something else?DR. NOLTE: Despite all of the
rhetoric and all of the strong emotions that surround any discussion of
abortion, I have witnessed the negative effects of abortion on women.
Women who are suffering because of a past abortion deserve to have their
suffering acknowledged, and women who are contemplating abortion
deserve to know that it might really have a negative impact on their
lives. I work in women’s health. It is my job to stand up for them.

LOPEZ: In your daily work, what
are the needs of women? Are there ways the state could help with any of
them? Perhaps as part of a governor’s reconsidered women’s rights and
health agenda?DR. NOLTE: We should support
women who are pregnant with access to good prenatal care. Provide
support for the wonderful network of pregnancy centers trying to help
women with housing, clothing, parenting classes, etc., equal to the
support that the state provides to abortion clinics. Simplify adoption
laws and make the state more adoption-friendly. Fund medical centers
that want to provide perinatal hospice services, grief counseling, and
support to families given a poor prenatal diagnosis. Strengthen
pregnancy-discrimination laws. Encourage employers to create a work
environment that allows parents to parent their children and doesn’t
penalize parents when a child becomes ill. New York lawmakers need to
consider a healthier approach to policy than affects women and children
in our state. Expanding abortion access in a state with such high rates
can’t be a priority.

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

“It
must be borne in mind,” he wrote, “that no error could persist unless
it contained a grain of truth. Indeed, an error is all the more
dangerous the greater that grain of truth is, for then the temptation it
exerts is all the greater.”

So
wrote Cardinal Ratzinger in 1984. The danger in question was that of
“liberation theology,” offering itself in the name of deep sympathies
for the poor, but working, inescapably, “to recast the whole Christian
reality.” The language and the scheme was Marxist. The emphasis on the
Bible put the accent on History, and in good Marxist-Hegelian terms,
the unfolding of History would now become the source of “revelation” and
“the real interpreter of the Bible.” History, then, would become the
“real bringer of salvation.” In this way, “the concept of history
swallows up the concepts of God and of Revelation.”

A
large part of the power of Joseph Ratzinger’s writing was that he could
recognize that “grain of truth” contained in the argument of his
adversaries. He would give them the deep respect of taking them
seriously. And in recognizing that grain of truth they had in hand, or
the ground of their decent motives, he would penetrate to the root of
things. He would run deeper than they were capable of running, and in
uncovering the source of the fallacies that beguiled them, he would make
ever clearer the truths they were missing at the very core of things.

But suddenly, this week, it kicks in: He really is leaving.
By the end of this week, the papacy of Benedict XVI will have ended.
What makes it all the more jolting is that he has been such a vivid
presence for so long – since well before he ascended to the papacy in
2005. Part of the wonder and astonishment for some of us in 2005 was
that the man who had been such a towering intellectual presence would
actually be elevated by his “colleagues” to the head of affairs.

But
that may simply be a sign of the fact that the electorate here showed a
certain clear-headedness – and humility. They were able to recognize a
figure among them whose force as a teacher truly exceeded their own. No
doubt with the Holy Spirit offering a Helping Hand.

In
the writings of John Paul II one would be struck instantly by the
piety, and very quickly it would become apparent that one was in the
presence of an accomplished philosopher. With Benedict I had a sense of
things slightly reversed. It would be apparent on the first page that
one was listening to a world-class philosopher, and the piety would soon
come through, quite as powerful and glowing.

Cardinal Ratzinger in 1984

Part
of the oddity of this moment is that he is receding from the papacy
even when, as it seems to me, his force as a writer and teacher is
unimpaired.

He
took the name of Benedict in order to focus on the restoration of
Europe and the West, and the central problem, the central danger, was
the corrosive force of moral relativism. He would write, as pope, on
the “dictatorship of relativism.” But his teaching in this vein had
long preceded his elevation to the papacy.

The
assault on reason had come, in aggressive form, from the Communists and
Fascists with their “pathology of reason” – their powers of calculation
detached from any moral grounding. But the dangers now came even from
within the Church. There were those nuns and priests, thinking tenderly
but thinking faintly. They would be drawn to “liberation theology”
without quite realizing the line they were crossing as they absorbed a
Marxist-materialist view of the world.

There
were notable Catholic jurists who rejected natural law because they
didn’t think it would command wide agreement. But as Cardinal Ratzinger
pointed out in 1999, the lawyers put their accent on the “common
convictions of citizens” when they had lost their confidence that they
could find, in the natural law, the standards of judgment on right and
wrong.

In
his famous Regensburg Address in 2006, he ignited a storm of protest
when he dared to suggest a certain tendency in Islam to beget violent
jihadism, or a willingness to seek conversion through lethal coercion.
And yet Benedict might have been bringing off a trick-of-the-eye with
rhetorical skill. He identified the problem here with the most strident
and lethal denial of reason in jihadism.

But
the problem he took as the most decisive had its origins really in
Protestantism, with its rejection of natural law and moral reasoning as
instruments that could deny the freedom and supremacy of God. That
rejection of moral reasoning in the name of faith (or sola scriptura)
was reinforced by the drift in philosophy to separate theology from
philosophy, faith from reason. Religion would be reduced then to
subjective beliefs cut off from the things we can reliably know. And a
philosophy determined to drive theology out of its domain ends up, in
its sweep of skepticism, by driving reason out of philosophy itself.

Benedict
challenged the best that the secular worlds could offer up in their
defense by their most prestigious philosophers. And he forced them in
turn to rise in meeting him. His arguments will be with us to be read
and read again, and to teach us anew, even if he retires now to the
quiet of his study.

The Illinois House Executive Committee approved a bill to redefine marriage late last night by okaying SB 10. The bill passed out of committee by a 6-5 vote. It now goes to the full House of Representatives for consideration.
All four Republican lawmakers voted against the bill and were joined by Democrat State Representative Eddie Lee Jackson of East St. Louis. It is important to note that Democrat State Representative Luis Arroyo (D-Chicago) made a point to qualify his yes vote, saying that he would vote to get the bill out of committee but would not
be supporting the legislation on the House floor, citing
his religious faith and the churches in his district as his reasons for
not supporting it. No, This anti-family legislation is not as popular as some would have us believe. They do not have the votes necessary to pass this bill, and we must continue and even intensify our opposition to this bill.

Bottom line: same-sex marriage is not inevitable.

Those who testified against SB 10 included Dr. Jennifer Roback-Morse, President of the Ruth Institute (a project of the National Organization for Marriage); Kellie M. Fiedorek, Litigation Counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom; Linda Jernigan
who lived as a lesbian for nearly twenty years but through the power of
Jesus Christ now walks free from the homosexual lifestyle; and Pastor Danny Holliday, from Alton, Illinois.
To watch a video of the entire hearing, please click HERE.

Dr. Roback-Morse began her testimony by asking and answering the questions, “What is marriage,” and “What is owed the child”:

I urge you to reject the bill before you,
SB 10. I urge you to reject any other legislation that would redefine
the most basic structural feature of marriage, by removing the dual
gender requirement for marriage. Redefining marriage redefines
parenthood. “Marriage equality” cannot be achieved. Making same sex
couples the legal equivalent of opposite sex couples will introduce new
and deeper inequalities into society.

Most importantly, redefining marriage
creates structural injustices against children. To see this, we must ask
ourselves: what is the essential public purpose of marriage, and what
is owed to the child?

The essential public purpose of marriage
is to attach mothers and fathers to their children and to one another.
And the child is entitled to a relationship with and care from both of
the people who brought him into being. Therefore, the child has a
legitimate interest in the stability of his parents’ union. But no child
can defend these entitlements himself. Nor is it adequate to make
restitution after these rights have been violated. The child’s rights
must be supported pro-actively, before harm is done.

Marriage is adult society’s institutional
structure for protecting these legitimate interests of children.
Without this public purpose, we would not need marriage at all as a
distinct social institution.

We often hear the objection that some
marriages don’t have children. This is perfectly true. However, every
child has parents. The objection that some marriages don’t have children
stands the rationale for marriage on its head, viewing marriage from
the adult’s perspective, instead of the child’s.

Same sex couples and opposite sex couples
are obviously different with respect to this essential public purpose
of marriage. And treating different things differently is not
discrimination. That is why, in the few cases where courts have found
opposite sex marriage to be unlawful discrimination, they have had to
come up with purposes for marriage that have nothing to do with
procreation or attaching children to parents.

Thus, my first and most basic point is
this: It is a structural injustice to a child, to deprive him or her of a
relationship with both parents, without some compelling or unavoidable
reason.

It may sound odd but, even though this passed out of committee, I am
encouraged by the progress we are making in Springfield . At the same
time, we cannot let down our guard for a moment. This is still an “all
hands on deck” situation, and only with your help will we be able to
stop this bill from being passed! Take ACTION: If you haven’t yet sent an email or a fax to your state representative — it is time to speak up now! Click HERE to
contact your Illinois Representative and tell him/her to oppose the
effort to redefine marriage!. You can also call him/her through the
Capitol switchboard at (217) 782-2000.
Better still, schedule a meeting with your representative, bring as
many constituents as you can, and ask him or her the questions available
HERE.More ACTION: Contact
your family and friends at church and let them know that they should
speak out against this radical proposal — post your opinions on Facebook
and Twitter.

On February 19, nine U.S. Senators and two U.S. Representatives joined a “friend of the court” brief
in Hobby Lobby’s 10th Circuit Court appeal over the Obamacare
anti-conscience mandate, highlighting the Obama Administration’s refusal
to recognize business owners’ religious freedom.
The congressional brief explains that the federal government “may not pick and choose whose exercise of religion is protected and whose is not.”
The brief is signed by original supporters of the 1993 federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act
(RFRA), which prohibits substantial government burdens on religious
exercise unless the government can show a compelling interest in
burdening religious liberty and does so through the least restrictive
means.
The congressional brief charges that the religious freedom law has
implications for the anti-conscience mandate’s assault on employers’
religious liberty, but that the Obama Administration has all but ignored
the statute in word and deed.
The Obama Administration’s “refusal to apply RFRA…turns the law of
religious freedom upside down,” the congressional brief states. “RFRA
places a heavy burden on Government and protects religion by default.
But the HHS mandate places a heavy burden on religion and protects
Government by default.”
That federal protection of religious liberty was broad as well as
overwhelmingly bipartisan. Various versions of RFRA were introduced by
then-Senator Joe Biden (D–DE), Senator Orrin Hatch (R–UT), and the late
Senator Ted Kennedy (D–MA), with the final version passed with broad
bipartisan support in both the House and Senate. The religious freedom
bill was signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton.
As the congressional brief explains, “Congress plainly wrote RFRA to
include corporations[.]” Yet, the Obama Administration has repeatedly
suggested that business owners’ right to religious freedom ends when
they walk into their workplaces because for-profit employers do not
engage in exercise of religion.
Such an offensively narrow view of faith in public life has
threatened the rights and livelihoods of many job-creating businesses
and their owners—including Hobby Lobby.
Hobby Lobby has over 500 stores in 41 states and employs more than 22,500 individuals. The Green family, who founded and runs Hobby Lobby, seeks to operate the company in accordance with Christian principles—including offering an employee health care plan that aligns with those values.
Under the Obamacare mandate, however, Hobby Lobby will be forced to provide and pay for abortion-inducing drugs—regardless of the owners’ religious objections to doing so—or face $1.3 million in fines per day.
Indeed, in exercising its new-found authority over health care,
provided by the overreaching arm of Obamacare, the Administration has
run roughshod over many employers’ religious liberty. Even in attempting
to conceal its assault on a fundamental freedom, the Administration has
put forth an unworkable and inadequate
“accommodation” that explicitly excludes business owners like the Green
family. Many employers’ religious freedom is now subject to the
haphazard negotiations of bureaucrats.
As Members of Congress write in the brief: “By failing to follow
RFRA…[the government] guaranteed that impassioned political
considerations would take the place of reasoned legal consideration.”
The problems with this mandate and others like it in the future
should have been foreseeable when Obamacare gave bureaucrats the power
to decide what insurance companies must cover, employers must provide,
and individuals must purchase.
Leaders at Hobby Lobby, like the more than 130 other plaintiffs
suing over the coercive mandate, remain hopeful that the courts will
have a better respect for the law and all Americans’ ability to live and
work in accordance with their faith.

February 26, 2013 (ALL) - I have
hesitated to write a commentary on the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI
because I believed that the words he used when he made the announcement
were sufficient. He did not suggest a secret illness or a conspiracy
afoot or anything of the kind. He said
quite plainly and most sincerely, “After having repeatedly examined my
conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths,
due to advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the
Petrine ministry.”
It had been my privilege over the past 16 years—since the time Pope John Paul II appointed me to the Pontifical Academy for Life—to have learned a great deal about that Holy Father’s closest ally, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.
Ratzinger’s writings were extensive and, after the conclave that
elevated him to Pope Benedict XVI, his encyclicals, books, and public
addresses have continued to teach, inspire, and spiritually support
anyone who wishes to live and act consistently with Catholic doctrine.
For that I am eternally grateful to this holy man.
When American Life League launched its campaign seeking the obedience
of bishops in enforcing Church law regarding the denial of Holy
Communion to those public figures who claimed to be Catholic, yet who
also gave their support to abortion, it was the Ratzinger memo entitled “Worthiness to Receive Holy Communion” that became our guiding light.
The Holy Father never abandoned truth. One of his strongest American supporters, Phil Lawler, said of the Holy Father’s resignation,

So why has he chosen to resign, if he can still perform his duties so
well? The answer, I suspect, is that he cannot perform those duties
often enough to satisfy his own standards. He can analyze and preach and
teach, but only with sufficient rest. As the rest periods grow longer,
and sessions of work shorter, he cannot do all that he sees must be
done.

Lawler also pointed out, as have others, that during the Holy Father’s
pontificate, many of his top senior staff have not acted in accord with
his statements, but have attempted to blunt or even misinterpret what he
said. The example of his teaching on the use of condoms as a “treatment” for AIDS comes to mind as but one glaring example of this sort of contradiction. And there are many more!
Steve Jalsevac reflected on the Holy Father’s decision, telling LifeSiteNews readers,

We should remember these words from his first Mass as pope:

“Pray for me, that I may not flee for fear of the wolves.”

Is he fleeing from the wolves, especially those within the Church, who
he knew would inevitably, incessantly attack him during his pontificate?
Very doubtful. They have been even more ferocious than he anticipated
in response to his determined rolling back of some of the chaos that
followed Vatican II and his strong rebukes to all the elements of the
culture of death. Benedict’s resignation should instead, in my opinion,
be seen as a deeply humbling self-sacrifice to pave the way for an
urgently needed stronger pope and stronger Church.

To that I would add that, by his very example, the Holy Father has
illuminated with clear and convincing courage what is expected of a pope
during such challenging times. Shortly after his announcement, during
his February 13 general audience, he said:

It is not easy to be faithful to Christian marriage, practice mercy in
everyday life, leave space for prayer and inner silence, it is not easy
to publicly oppose choices that many take for granted, such as abortion
in the event of an unwanted pregnancy, euthanasia in case of serious
illness, or the selection of embryos to prevent hereditary disease. . . .

What is at the core of the three temptations that Jesus suffered? . . .
It is the proposal to manipulate God, to use him for your own
interests, for your own glory and success.

Everyone should then ask: What is the role [of] God in my life? And is He the Lord or am I?

What a fitting challenge for the Holy Father to each of us in view of
the fact that he has clearly listened to God and has made the decision
he has discerned is the Lord’s will for him at this crucial time in the
life of the Church. His very action teaches us what it means to be
humble before the Lord.
As we thank God for Pope Benedict XVI’s holy example, let us pray that
the Lord will be with the cardinals during their time of decision.Judie Brown is president and cofounder of American Life League and a three-time appointee to the Pontifical Academy for Life.

Once again, a film about “euthanasia” has won an Oscar. Back in the
‘70s the tear-jerker movies were about people dying of cancer. In the
‘80s and ‘90s, it was people dying of AIDS. For the 21st century, the
new chic is euthanasia/assisted suicide/”mercy killing” movies. Million Dollar Baby, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, The English Patient, The Sea Inside, Un Dimanche à Kigali, Le Temps qui Reste, The Barbarian Invasion (Les Invasions Barbares), Magnus
– all have taken on euthanasia/assisted suicide/”mercy killing” from
the point of view of non-disabled white people and come to the same
conclusion; great idea!
Now we have the film Amour, directed by Michael Haneke,
whose leading actors took the Palm d’Or at Cannes in 2012. The story
concerns Anna and George, an elderly couple, former music teachers who
live in a nice apartment in Paris. After a series of strokes, Anna is
partially paralyzed and her memory begins to fail. The couple
withdraws, refusing contact and the help of friends, relatives and
neighbours, while George cares for Anna as her mental and physical
abilities decline. In the end he suffocates her.
Given the film industry’s adoration of movies that end with a man
“lovingly” killing a spouse, it was no surprise when Amour was awarded
an Oscar for Best Foreign Picture.
In the real world, many studies have shown that in cases of “assisted suicide”/euthanasia/”mercy killing in elderly couples, the woman is generally an unwilling victim, and there is often a history of domestic violence.
This fact is rarely reflected in the superficial media coverage in the
immediate aftermath of such gruesome crimes. By the time the truth of
the matter has been uncovered, the media spotlight has moved on, and the
public is left with the same false impression; “he did it for love.”
There has been almost no discussion in the francophone media of the disability and human rights problems with the narrative of Amour,
and little in the Anglophone press either. No critics questioned the
film’s seemingly inevitable ending, or George’s motives for killing his
wife. Not surprising, but disappointing anyway.
It’s troubling that films like this come out so often, but fail to
educate the public about the real issues in assisted suicide and
euthanasia. In the case of Clint Eastwood’s film, his consistent and
vocal opposition to the Americans with Disabilities Act suggests a
possible motive for killing off his disabled protagonist. For other
writers and filmmakers, the examination of the issue generally arises
more from fear of disability, unresolved grief, or other feelings common
to non-disabled people.
Like other media portrayals, these films usually show people with
disability either as sad, tragic and incapable victims, or as
inspirational over-achievers, but never as ordinary human beings. Nor
do the filmmakers focus on their struggles against the external barriers
and discrimination that limit their life options, focusing instead on
the physical changes that are natural to the human experience.
The message is clear; the lives of those of us with disabilities are
not worth living. We are better off dead, and the sooner the better.
These attitudes only perpetuate fear of and discrimination against
disabled people, and the more often this lie is spoken, the deeper
entrenched the fear becomes. Through that discrimination, the lie
becomes the truth, and pressure grows to allow assisted suicide and
euthanasia for old, ill and disabled people.
Amy E. Hasbrouck is the director of Toujours Vivant-Not Dead Yet, a project of the Council of Canadians with Disabilities that unites people with disabilities who oppose assisted suicide, euthanasia and other discriminatory end-of-life practices.
Source Not Dead Yet
February 26, 2013 | posted by Stephen Drake

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Note: One of the most powerful weapons in the pro-life
arsenal is the authentic testimony of those who have advocated for and
helped provide abortions, and later seen the light. People like Dr.
Bernard Nathanson, Carol Everett, and Abby Johnson have information and
insight that will help us win the fight against the abortion industry.Allentown, Pennsylvania native and mother of three Jewels
Green has made the courageous decision to finally speak up for life. In
her first public pro-life testimony, she told Live Action about suffering the pain of abortion as a teenager and later spending several years working in an abortion clinic.

This is her story:

“My first baby would be 22 this week.
I was a 17-year-old drug-using high school drop-out, but when the
lady wearing scrubs told me I was pregnant, I already thought of myself
as a new mother.

Jewels Green

Everyone wanted me to get an abortion… except me.
I actually stopped using drugs, went to the library and checked out a
book called Under 18 and Pregnant and started to read it to prepare. I
scheduled my first prenatal check-up. My boyfriend was relentless. I am
deliberately omitting the details of the violence, both real and
threatened, but I finally caved in to my boyfriend’s insistence to not
have our baby.
On January 4, 1989, he took me to the abortion clinic, but I literally ran out in the hope of saving my baby.
Two days later, on January 6, 1989, at 9 1/2 weeks gestation, I had
an abortion. It nearly killed me. No, not the surgical procedure, the
psychological aftermath. I attempted suicide three times after my
abortion and finally ended up in an adolescent psychiatric ward of a
community hospital for a month to recover.
I was coerced into having an abortion and thought that by becoming a
counselor at an abortion clinic, I could help others like me really talk
out their feelings on the issue, truly explore their options, and help
them make an honest, informed decision–or help them leave an abusive
situation.
I worked at an abortion clinic for five years (from age 18 to
23)—not the same one where I had my abortion. I started out on the
phone, then at the front desk checking in patients and accepting
payments, then I learned medical assisting and helped in the laboratory,
took vital signs in the recovery room, and did “dishes” in the
autoclave area. (I’ll come back to this). Then, after two years working
at the clinic and starting college as a psychology major, I was trained
as a counselor.
The “counseling” experience was not what I had hoped. Nearly every
pregnant woman coming to an abortion clinic for “options counseling” had
already made up her mind, but just wanted to check out the facility and
have her questions answered and perhaps her fears allayed. And most of
the women coming in felt they had no other choice. A few were truly
ambivalent.
This is where the pro-choice movement and clinics fail. Sure, we had a
little notebook with the names and numbers of two local adoption
agencies, but we were never trained or taught how the adoption process
works so we could explain it to women. We had the phone number of the
local WIC office, public assistance, etc., but again, knew nothing about
the process should anyone ever ask for details. If a pregnant woman
wanted to learn more about these other choices, the best the “options
counselor” could offer was a post-it note with a phone number hastily
scribbled on it.
During my time at the clinic, I was a staunch supporter of abortion
rights, while all the time knowing in my heart that I felt that what I
did was wrong, that I missed my baby, and that I wished things could be
different for me. In hindsight, I can see that by surrounding myself
with people who believed it was OK to abort babies, I was hoping that
someday I would be OK with aborting my baby. This never happened…
I have marched twice in Washington, D.C., in support of abortion
rights. I have lobbied inHarrisburg (the capital of Pennsylvania). I
have joined David Gunn, Jr., in lobbying Congress for stronger sanctions
against militant anti-abortion activists who harass pregnant women,
bomb abortion clinics, intimidate clinic staff, and murder physicians
(like David’s dad, Dr. David Gunn, who was killed by an anti-abortion
“activist”) – but even then I never agreed with rallying cries such as
“Abortion on demand and without apology!” chanted at such gatherings. It
was–and is–so much more complicated than that.
After graduating from college with a degree in psychology I left my
job at the clinic to work the overnight shift at a teen crisis hotline
for a year before moving to New York City to attend graduate school.
After earning my Master’s in psychology, I moved back to my hometown and
worked part-time at the clinic through much of my next pregnancy.
I remember one Saturday morning (a big “procedure day” when more than
20 abortions were scheduled and at least a dozen protestors were
outside, standing along the long driveway that led into the clinic
parking lot) when I was about six months along and very visibly
pregnant–much farther along than the 16 week abortion limit of the
clinic–when a protestor shouted to me, “Your baby loves you!”
I smiled to myself. When I got inside and started to help the nurse
set up the recovery room, I told her this, and she was angry and
appalled. Even then–as an active employee at the clinic–telling a
pregnant woman her baby loves her did not seem like such an
objectionable thing to say, or even to shout, at an obviously pregnant
woman.
Identifying myself as pro-life, though, did not come until many years
later. After finally forgiving myself for aborting my first child I was
able to see the world differently. After two failed marriages I was
able to finally commit and my husband and I have been married for eleven
years. After giving birth to three sons and feeling the life grow
inside me and knowing the fierce overwhelming love a mother can feel for
a child, I have been able to finally acknowledge that yes, life begins
at conception.
But it wasn’t until stumbling upon links to Abby Johnson’s YouTube
videos, and then reading her book Unplanned, that I could say out loud
that I was pro-life. It was Abby’s amazing story, and her courageous and
honest testimony, that helped me to openly join the ranks of the
pro-life movement.
And although I now consider myself pro-life, I simply cannot abide by
the extremists within the movement’s ranks who often act without
censure by many of the position’s vocal leadership. I was at the front
desk when the clinic was invaded on July 22, 1992, which we later dubbed
“The Wednesday From Hell.” Six people ran into the waiting room with a
huge metal contraption with multiple pipes attached that we all assumed
was a bomb until they slid their arms inside of it and started singing.
They were in the waiting room “attached” to that thing for seven hours
while local and state police and FBI agents attempted to negotiate with
and extract them from the device. They peed on the carpet. The clinic’s
daily functions continued in other parts of the facility.
Not one woman changed her mind as a result of this invasion.
I was also working the front desk on the day two Boston clinics were
attacked by an armed anti-abortion gunman who wounded five people and
killed two. The gunman remained at large for many hours before being
apprehended. Boston is a five-hour drive from where I worked and I
remained at the front desk. (My uncle, a police sergeant, insisted I
wear a bulletproof vest to work for a full week following that event,
and I did.) One of the former directors of the clinic I worked for had
her home broken into twice, another director routinely has her home
picketed and has been followed home from work by suspicious vehicles on
several occasions. There has to be a better way to further the cause of
life.
Speaking of which: abortion ends life. Period. This is not in
question nor should it be. This is a fundamental truth. I worked in the
autoclave room where the “products of conception” (as so many pro-choice
proponents—and abortion clinic counselors—call the fetus and placenta)
were rearranged and counted to make sure “we got everything.” For early
abortions, this meant floating the contents of the jar in water to
visualize the chorionic villi. For abortions from about 8 1/2 – 12
weeks, this meant counting hands and feet, making sure the spine and
ribcage and skull were present, you get the idea. For the abortions
where the gestational age of the fetus was in question, especially if
there was a chance it was an “oops,” meaning a pregnancy terminated
beyond the clinic’s legal limit of 14 weeks LMP (from last menstrual
period), the feet were measured to determine a more accurate gestational
age.
Working in the autoclave room was never, ever easy. I saw my lost
child in every jar of aborted baby parts. One night after working
autoclave my nightmares about dead babies were so gruesome and
terrifying and intense I met with the clinic’s director to talk about my
feelings.
She was very understanding, open and honest, and painfully forthright
when she told me, “What we do here is end a life. Pure and simple.
There is no disputing this fact. You need to be OK with this to work
here.” After a few days rotated out of the autoclave room, I felt I was
OK with this, and God help me, I went back.
When in my fourth year at the clinic they won approval to do
abortions up to 16 weeks LMP, one woman quit and two staff
members—myself included— refused to work on the “late days.” My boss was
very understanding and scheduled me to work with the non-pregnant GYN
patients those days.
For myself, I know in my heart that I would never again terminate a
pregnancy — EVER — nor would I ever work at an abortion clinic again. If
someone I love was facing an unplanned pregnancy, I would do my very
best to help her find a way to stay pregnant and give that baby a
chance—whether it be by becoming a parent, or by offering up the child
for adoption.
There are far too many innocent lives being snuffed out in our
country before they have the opportunity to take their first breath, and
as a nation we should be doing better. We need to do better. We need to
provide real resources to pregnant mothers facing an unplanned
pregnancy. The women and babies of our country deserve better. After
all, sometimes the best things in life aren’t planned.
Happy Nobirthday, Unbaby. I miss you every day. Love & tears, Mom.”Reprinted with permission from the Live Action blog.

Baby born after being saved from coerced abortion through texting

ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico, June 1, 2011 (OperationRescue.org) - A
teen mother, who was saved from a coerced abortion last October after a
sidewalk counselor texted her while she was inside the clinic, has given
birth to a beautiful, healthy boy named Manuel.
The little boy was born on May 10 weighing 7 pounds. The following week, his mother proudly graduated from high school.
Tara Shaver, a former intern for Operation Rescue, was sidewalk
counseling outside Planned Parenthood in Albuquerque, New Mexico, when
she received a call from a woman who told her that her grandson’s
girlfriend was being forced to get an abortion that she did not want.
The woman told Tara that her grandson, the baby’s father, also wanted to
keep the baby. They were desperate, because the girl was only 17 and
her mother was insisting on the abortion against the girl’s will. The
grandmother gave Tara the teen’s cell phone number.
Tara began a text-message conversation with the teen, who we will
call “Jane,” while she was inside the abortion clinic. Jane was six
weeks pregnant and was interested in seeing an ultrasound of her baby,
but still did not want to go through with the abortion. She told Tara
that her mom would not allow her to leave the clinic.
Tara continued to encourage her and even texted Jane a photo of a
pre-born baby at six weeks, the same age as her baby. Texting kept their
conversation private where a phone call would have alerted the mother
or the abortion clinic staff to Tara’s efforts to help Jane.
Finally, Jane came out of Planned Parenthood and spoke with Tara, and
before long, Jane’s father came to the clinic to pick her up and take
her safely home.
Tara’s last text to Jane that day was a loving word of encouragement.
“We are so proud of u! You are my hero, your baby is so proud too!”
Tara continued to follow up with her new friend, and shared in her
joy at the birth of her baby and her accomplishment of graduating with
her class.
“Coerced abortions are a very real and understated problem in our
country. Jane is a hero for having the courage to stand up for her baby
even though the deck was stacked against her. We congratulate her on the
birth of her precious son, Manuel, and on her graduation,” said Troy
Newman, president of Operation Rescue.
“But Jane could not have done it without Tara’s love and support. She
is also a hero too, for thinking ‘outside the box’ and using texting to
save Manuel’s life and protect Jane from the emotional trauma of a
coerced abortion,” Newman added. “Tara took time to follow up with Jane,
and make sure she had the help and support she needed. We are very
proud of Tara and all she and her husband, Bud, are accomplishing on the
pro-life mission field of Albuquerque.”This article reprinted with permission from OperationRescue.org.

There
is currently an attempt to pass the original federal Equal Rights
Amendment (ERA) in Illinois. Although ERA ran out of time for
ratification in 1978, its' supporters claim that if they can get 3 more
states to ratify it, then the 1982 deadline can be retroactively
extended, ensuring a binding constitutional amendment. The Illinois
House passed it in 2003, but it was blocked in the Illinois Senate. Now -
once again - it is in theIllinois House asHJRCA7, and it could come up for a House vote shortly.

Today,
with all the federal abuse of constitutional powers and limits taking
place, this threat needs to be taken very seriously.

ERA is not about women's rights.

It's about creating a genderless society
that removes "sex" as a legal characteristic. Its' wording states:
"Equality of rights under law shall not be denied or abridged by the
United States or any State on account of state.

ERA will remove all ability to make legal distinctions based on gender.
A a result, all laws and benefits currently protecting women will be
thrown out. Current laws that govern alimony, child support, a woman's
ability to claim support from her husband, and exemption from military
draft registration will be wiped away. In the 18 states that have passed
state Equal Rights Amendments, there has been further evidence of women
being harmed by ERA.

ERA will legalize all gay-rights.

This will include same-sex marriages,
under the justification that the government cannot discriminate based
on sex. Our ability to define marriage based on gender will be
eliminated.

Hawaii's Supreme Court ruled that the
denial of marriage licenses to same-sex couples is sex discrimination
and unconstitutional under Hawaii's state ERA (Bachr v. Lewin, 852 P.2d
44, 1993). The people of Hawaii had to pass a state constitutional
amendment to overturn this decision.

ERA will further entrench abortion in our society and legally mandate taxpayer funding for elective abortions.
The New Mexico Supreme Court recently ruled under their state ERA that
since only women undergo abortions, the denial of taxpayer funding is
"sex discrimination" (N.M. Right to Choose/NARAL v. Johnson, 975 P.2d
841, 1998).

In
addition, the Era would empower the federal courts to determine the
meaning of "equality of rights" and "sex." In essence we would be
handing the state's legislative power to Congress and the unelected
judges of our federal courts.

ERA
will transfer large amounts of power from the state government to the
federal government, since it empowers Congress to enforce it.

ERA would empower federal courts to determine the meaning of "equality of rights" and "sex". In essence we will be handing the state's legislative power to Congress and the unelected judges of our federal courts.

The
ERA's draconian effect will impact all 50 states with one punch, due to
the fact that it is an amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Clearly
the ERA is not about women's rights. It is about creating a genderless
society that removes "sex" as a legal characteristic - the ramifications
of which will negatively impact women, families, society, and the
structure of our government.

Women
already have claim to equal rights through the 14th Amendment (Section
1) as well as many other laws. In fact, in an analysis of the impact of
the 1970's ERA, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg was unable to find any
changes required in employment laws.